


Echo

by thoughtwewerefriends



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Canon Compliant, Exorcised Josh, Exorcisms, M/M, Post-Canon, Wendigo Josh, the twins are still dead
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-04
Updated: 2017-09-17
Packaged: 2018-11-23 04:01:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11394936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thoughtwewerefriends/pseuds/thoughtwewerefriends
Summary: “Chris, they found him. They found Josh.”***In which Chris works hard to pick up the pieces and make everything feel normal again.((I suck at summaries))





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this fic is based off the whole "the wendigo can mimic its prey" thing, but modified just a tiny little bit? To make it so that wendigo can only mimic what its already heard, as far as tone/actual words/voice/etc. I know this is a stretch, but I talked this out and it sounded way cool in theory! We'll see!
> 
> Thank you so much for clicking to read, please feel free to leave me kudos and comments to encourage me to keep this fic going!  
> Going to try to update once a week, but with my hectic work schedule, regular updates might not start happening until the end of July!

It was late. Technically.

For Chris, it was still far too early to crawl into bed and actually sleep. He was exhausted, though, more than exhausted. This was the heaviest his eyelids had felt in weeks.

Since everything happened.

He stripped himself down to his tatty old boxers (that he was almost confident didn’t _originally_ belong to him, but had wound up in his laundry basket anyway), pulled back his comforter, and slid down into bed, barely able to get his phone plugged in before his head sagged against the pillow, eyelids drooping blissfully. For once, he was going to bed at ease. Maybe he wouldn’t even have nightmares.

Chris’s eyes snapped open at the persistent buzzing, practically rattling his skull. He fished his phone from where it had slid under his pillow, squinting at the screen without the aid of his glasses. He frowned when he saw Sam’s name.

He hadn’t really talked to her since what happened on the mountain. Maybe twice, in the past three weeks. Maybe.

Anxiety clawed at his gut, and he swiped his finger across the screen, licking his lips and holding the phone up to his ear. “Isn’t it past your bedtime?” he mumbled, doing his best to sound like he hadn’t just dipped his toes into REM sleep. 

“Chris.” Sam sounded upset. Anxious. Insistent.

Chris was suddenly way more awake.

“Chris, they found him. They found Josh.”

Chris’s stomach dropped to his knees, and he suddenly was holding back bile as he leapt out of bed more athletically than he’d ever done anything before. “Where is he?” he demanded, doing his best to get both legs in his jeans simultaneously while still standing up. “Sam, where is he? I need to see him.” He quickly pulled on two t-shirts and a sweater, turning around and around, trying to locate his shoes. Where the hell had he kicked them off?

Sam huffed, shushing someone in the background. “I’m parked outside,” she said. “Jess and Em are with me. Get your ass in gear, Hartley.”

Chris was out the door before he could even say goodbye, locking it behind himself and shoving his glasses haphazardly back onto his face, sprinting down the back stairs and out into the frigid February night. He was buckling his belt when he got down to Sam’s car, parked crooked against the curb.

Jess was sitting in the passenger seat, and she pointed towards the back. Chris climbed in without a word, plopping into the back seat, beside Emily, who promptly gave him a Look, pursed lips and all.

“You look like shit,” she said bluntly as the car peeled away from the curb, arching a brow at him.

“I was sleeping,” Chris grumbled back, rolling his eyes. “What’s going on? Where did they find him? Is he okay?”

The look that passed between the three girls wasn’t lost on him, as oblivious as everyone thought he was, and it did nothing to reassure him. His heart sank, and he started breathing harder, anxiety clawing its way up his insides.

Jess turned around, her look nothing but sympathy. He glanced at Sam in the rearview, and her face was completely expressionless, but he could tell that she was holding it that way on purpose. Finally, he turned to Emily, and even she looked a bit sad, reaching over and giving his thigh a squeeze.

“Fuck,” he said, and the curse came out choked and strangled, eyes clouding with tears in record time.

“He’s alive, but it’s really possible he won’t be for long,” Sam said, and her tone was calm and even, but it did nothing to help Chris. If anything, it wrecked him further. He was going to have to mourn the loss of his best friend _again_.

When they got out of the car at the hospital, the four of them jogged towards the door, Chris, unsurprisingly, taking point. Matt, Mike, and Ashley were waiting for them. Chris tried to ignore the way Ashley was looking at him. Like she pitied him. Like she was angry at him. 

He couldn’t focus on that now.

He pushed his way inside, leading the group up to the reception desk, the others following, crowding up behind him. He couldn’t imagine how ridiculous they looked. A group of young adults, all in various states of dress, most looking like they hadn’t slept in days, leaning forward to catch every word the receptionist said.

They were instructed to wait in the waiting room down the hall, told that Josh was undergoing urgent care at the moment and that he wasn’t fit for visitors, but a doctor should be out to talk to them within the hour to let them know what was going on. Chris wanted to press for more information, but it was pretty clear that she didn’t have it to give, judging by the sympathetic look on her face.

The group set off in a herd, Jess and Sam on either side of Chris, ushering him to a seat and helping him into it. He wasn’t sure how close to collapse he looked, but he must have looked worse for wear if they were trying to hold him up.

It was almost two hours until a doctor came out to see them. Sam, who had fallen asleep against Chris’s shoulder, was violently jolted awake as the blond jumped to his feet, tired blue eyes pinned to the white jacket in front of him.

“I need to see him,” he blurted, almost immediately, speaking over whatever the doctor had tried to say.

The doctor grimaced. “Joshua isn’t really in any sort of condition to have visitors at the moment,” he replied, and something about the tone he used rubbed Chris all sorts of wrong ways. “My name is Doctor Benjamin Ritter, and I’m going to be the primary specialist overseeing Josh while he’s here with us. Now, these circumstances are especially unique, because --”

“I need to see Josh,” Chris said again, voice coming out a lot firmer this time. The doctor just looked at him, and he could feel a hand against his forearm.

Instead of standing around playing staring contest, he abruptly burst into motion, pushing past the doctor, eyes focused on the door that he had come out of. He ignored the calls from his friends, from Dr. Ritter, his vision narrowing down until all he could see was that door.

He threw it open with all the grace of a drunk man stumbling into his apartment at three in the morning, squinting through the darkness. Why were the lights off? He could see three figures in the dim light filtering in from the hallway. Two of them were wearing scrubs, the other in what Chris could easily identify as muddy, bloody overalls.

“Josh,” he whispered, shoulders slumping. He could feel an unpleasant buzzing at the back of his skull, something nagging at him. Something felt wrong.

He could see Josh’s face in profile. Slowly, slowly, Josh turned his head, and Chris had to fight hard not to evacuate the contents of his stomach onto the pristine tile of the hospital room floor. Josh’s mouth had been torn open, ripped and jagged along the left side of his face, exposing rows of sharp, jagged teeth. What had once been a wide eye with an objectively gorgeous deep green iris was now larger than it had any right to be, milky white and dead, rolling around in his head seemingly of its own volition, as if it was looking for something.

Chris staggered back a step, breath punching in and out of him almost painfully as a red-black vignette slowly clouded his vision. The motion had both of Josh’s eyes snapping onto him, locking on and staring him down with something Chris could only weakly describe to himself as _hunger_.

Josh opened his mouth, his lungs filling with air, and released an ungodly, but not unfamiliar screech. Chris’s knees gave out from under him, consciousness failing him before his back even hit the floor.

***

When Chris’s eyes opened again, he was flat on his back, staring up into a painfully bright white fluorescent light. He groaned, lifting his hand to his head, squeezing his eyes shut again. God, he felt like his skull was being split in half. What kind of cruel and unusual punishment was this?

A rustling beside the bed startled him out of his pity party, and his eyes cracked open again, gaze sliding over to the figure in the chair beside his bed.

“I don’t know how you sit like that,” he mumbled.

Sam, who was curled uncomfortably in the straight-backed armchair looked up at him, and promptly rolled her eyes. She let her book fall closed, index finger wedged between the pages to hold her place. “I don’t like how you pass out directly onto your face,” she snarked, swatting Chris in the arm with her book. “Seriously, Chris, what were you thinking?”

“I didn’t know,” he muttered, holding back a wince at how childish he sounded in that moment. Of course he knew. He just hadn’t wanted to admit it to himself. “How is he?”

Sam sighed, unfolding her legs, stretching out for a minute. When she looked him right in the eyes again, her lips were pressed into a thin, pale line, and her eyes were empty. “Look, Chris,” she started slowly.

Chris’s stomach was suddenly in his throat, heart racing.

“They have him...sedated.” Sam was being careful with her words. This wasn’t good. None of this was good. “They said we could go in and see him, before they try anything. Just to see him.” She cut herself off abruptly, but Chris could hear the unspoken words. _One last time._

They made their way to Josh’s room together, led by Dr. Ritter. He looked tired. Stressed. Chris couldn’t even imagine what it was like to be in his shoes.

When the door to Josh’s room was pushed open, the lights were still off, leaving the room bathed in the white-blue glow of the lights from the hallway. Chris glanced nervously at Sam, before shuffling forward slowly, heart thundering in his ears as he approached the bed. Josh looked peaceful here, like he was truly at rest.

Swallowing past the lump in his throat, Chris spoke. “Hey, man,” he whispered. “No offense, but you kinda look like an extra from one of your dad’s stupid movies.” He reached over, gently laying his hand on Josh’s hand. His skin was so cold. Icy.

It was like flipping a switch. Josh’s eyes snapped open, and a rattling hiss escaped his throat. Chris retracted his hand, but the movement just made it worse. Josh was suddenly a flurry of movement, and before the blond could stumbled back from the bed, he was caught by searing pain.

His hand came up to cover it, and suddenly Sam was there, yanking him backwards. One glance assured him of the fact that his neck was bleeding. Josh had attacked him. He was bleeding. Chris couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, couldn’t think. Everything around him faded, reality muting except for those disgusting, godawful screeches.

“Knock it off!” he heard himself shouting, voice angry and desperate, eyes fixed on the creature in the bed, thrashing against the grip of the nurses holding onto him. “Quit fucking around, Josh! It’s me! It’s Chris! You _know_ me!”

Suddenly everything was silent. Josh’s mouth snapped shut, and those mismatched eyes were fixed on him once more, squinting at the light framing Chris where he stood struggling against Sam’s frantic tugging.

Slowly, very slowly, Josh’s mouth opened, and another hiss stuttered out of him, followed by what was definitely the Washington’s voice. His mouth didn’t move. It almost sounded like a recording.

“I thought we were _friends_!”

The door swung shut, slamming in Chris’s face.

He watched the world fade to white, Josh’s cry playing on repeat in his mind.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> is this a filler chapter, you ask? yeah, kinda.
> 
> not a lot of plot, but i did establish a...few dynamics....

Waking up in the hospital again felt like some sick kind of deja vu.

This time when he came to, Chris was gasping, heart pounding against his skull as his vision struggled to focus. Struggled, and struggled, and struggled. He lifted a clumsy hand, intending to check his face for his glasses, but ending up gracelessly slapping himself directly in the eye socket. A low groan left him, and he let his eyes fall shut again, resigning to just sleep forever.

“Are you done passing out now, or is that something we still have to worry about?”

Chris pushed himself up onto his elbows, ignoring the cold rush of vertigo as he squinted at the figure beside his bed. Sam. Of course it was. He heaved a dramatic sigh, rolling his eyes. “I’m not making a habit out of passing out, Samantha.”

“Coulda fooled me,” she shot back, pressing his glasses into the palm of his hands. “Twice in twenty-four hours is a new record, I think.”

“Could you, like, go away?” Chris mumbled, sliding his glasses onto his face, blinking as the room came into sharp focus. He’d gotten new glasses when he’d gotten home. The ones he’d worn through everything had cracked, frames bent beyond repair, and he’d needed a prescription update anyway.

He sat up slowly, shoulders hunching as the moment of levity dissipated, and the weight of their grim situation settled down around them like a suffocating smog snuggie. His hand lifted, brushing against tape, bandages. Josh…

“They had to give you stitches,” Sam said, voice low and cautious. “He got you pretty bad.”

“He didn’t mean it,” Chris rushed out, turning wide eyes to Sam. The last thing he wanted was his best friend being charged with some kind of attempted murder bullshit. He wasn’t himself. Josh would never, ever try to kill him, Chris was confident on that fact. If he had nothing else, he had the knowledge that had his best friend been coherent and present, no one would have gotten hurt.

Sam frowned, dropping her gaze to her lap. “Chris…”

The tone was enough to have anxiety worming through him, snapping him to attention. “Sam.” Short, staccato, sharp.

“No one really knows how to deal with this. Not from any kind of medical or scientific standpoint.”

“So, what are they doing? How are they going to help him? How are they going to fix this?”

Sam winced, and Chris immediately braced himself for more bad news. She was so bad at laying things on easy. Despite being easily the most empathetic out of the entire group, everyone hated hearing bad news from her, because she always drew it out far too long. Chris didn’t have time for that. He needed to know, no holds barred, no punches pulled, no words minced.

“They’re going to try an exorcism,” Sam said finally, leveling a gaze at Chris.

He couldn’t stop his brow from knitting. Surely that wasn’t the safest way to go about this. There had to be another option. The look on Sam’s face told him that they weren’t considering anything else.

“When are they doing it?” he asked finally, voice inflectionless. Was this real? Was this happening? This felt so _fake_. Like they were in some kind of bad, cliche, horror movie. He watched Sam’s eyes nervously slide to the clock on the wall, and Chris’s back was immediately up. “ _Now_?”

“The person that they called got here while you were out. They might be done by now. I don’t really have any sort of frame of reference for how long exorcisms should take.” Sam scoffed. “Pretty confident this isn’t as simple as waving a crucifix around and dousing Josh with holy water, or something.”

Chris shifted, throwing his legs over the side of his bed. “I need to--”

“Absolutely not,” Sam cut in, shaking her head firmly. She stood, putting a hand on Chris’s chest, caging him in so he couldn’t get up from the bed. “I’m putting my foot down. You’re not seeing him again until Dr. Ritter okays him for visitors. I’m not gonna have you falling on your face again.”

“Sam, you don’t understand.”

“I _do_ understand, Chris. That’s why I’m trying to be the rational one here, as always, and make sure you two don’t see each other ‘til you’re both ready. Until everyone involved is sure you can handle it.”

Damn her for being sensible. Damn her for being _right_.

He slumped, resigned. “Is he gonna make it?” he asked weakly. “Is he gonna be okay?”

Sam dropped her hand, gently placing it over Chris’s instead. “I can’t make any promises. None of us know.”

The door clicked open, and the next few moments were filled with a nurse checking Chris’s stitches, changing his bandages, informing him twice that if the slashes had been just a bit deeper or just a little bit further to the right or the left, he could have died. Sam just scowled at him until he got the hint to shut the hell up.

He was cleared to leave the room, and he and Sam migrated toward the waiting room again, where Chris was pleasantly surprised (for the most part) to find that they weren’t the only two hanging around. Mike, Ashley, and Emily were sitting in the hard plastic chairs, looking a combination of tired and worried.

Emily’s eyes were closed, but Chris could tell by the firm set of her jaw and the crease in her brow that she was most definitely not sleeping and was very keenly aware of everything going on around her.

Mike met his eyes just for a moment, and Chris wasn’t imperceptive enough to say that that meant nothing. Mike almost looked _remorseful_ , for the first time in his fucking life. The blond responded with a minute incline of his head, a hard stare, and Mike was looking away suddenly, eyes dropping to his crossed arms.

Ashley was on her feet before Chris could decide where to sit, and a sick feeling stirred in his gut as she came closer.

“Hey,” she said softly, looking everywhere but directly at him.

Chris found that he was having the same issue, staring over her head to the bright red exit sign across the room, eyes narrowing. “Hi,” he said, and the greeting came out a lot harsher than he’d meant it to.

“Chris, look, I just,” she stammered, floundering.

He stayed silent, eyes dropping to watch her face contort with about six different emotions, his jaw clenched tight.

“I’m sorry,” she finally said, and it was less than underwhelming.

“Sorry, Ash? For what? For feeling completely guiltless? For incriminating my best friend to the fucking police and feeling absolutely no remorse?” He shook his head. “Save it,” he muttered, waving her away, moving to sit down beside Sam.

A quick glance around the room revealed that the rest of the group were staring at him, and he just shrugged his shoulders, dropping his gaze to his feet, something like rage pounding through his veins. He knew that he wasn’t the only one that was angry. A few of the others had come to him, had let him know what Ashley had told them about her interrogation. Sam, Emily, Matt. Ashley had worked hard to make it seem like this had all been Josh’s fault, when it was so, so clear that it couldn’t have been.

They sat in silence for what felt like days before Dr. Ritter suddenly appeared, startling all of them with the sudden change of energy. Five asses suddenly lifted out of chairs, crowding around the doctor, exploding into a flurry of questions, all of them talking over each other.

The doctor handled it gracefully, holding up a hand to silence the group before attempting to speak. “From what we can gather, it was a success. I won’t say your friend is back to normal, but he is stable, and the chance that he’ll make a full recovery are extremely high, almost certain.”

Chris nearly fell over from relief, tears springing to his eyes without permission, and he would have felt embarrassed if he hadn’t seen the shine in Sam’s eyes as well. He grinned, ignoring that he may be sounding like a broken record now when he asked, breathlessly, “When can we see him?” His friends tittered in general agreement. 

“Well, we’ve booked him in for surgery, and he’ll be going into the operating room in the next hour or so. He’ll need time to recover after that, but he should be A-OK for visitors by tomorrow.”

Chris frowned. No. No, tomorrow wasn’t soon enough. “We can’t even peek in? Just to see him?”

Dr. Ritter gave him a sympathetic smile, shaking his head, sighing. “I know that you’re all eager to check up on him, but I’m sure none of us can really imagine what sort of stress Joshua’s body underwent during this whole…process,” he said carefully. “We need to give him some time to rest and recuperate. You should all give yourselves some time to rest. Go home, kids. Get some sleep. I assure you, you’ll be contacted as soon as he’s ready for you.”

The group sighed collectively. Sam thanked the doctor for his time, and they all turned towards each other, exchanging thin-lipped glances, around their little semi-circle.

“Well,” Mike finally said. “Guess we should head out. Ash, you need a ride?” Ashley nodded silently. “Right.” He looked at Sam, and then at Chris, holding eye contact with him for a little longer than absolutely necessary. “Call me when you hear anything, alright? Phone chain. Like the old days.”

A ghost of a smile passed across Chris’s lips, and he nodded. He watched Mike and Ash walk away, him taking long strides, and her struggling to catch up, as if he was purposely trying to leave her behind. Chris didn’t blame him.

Em turned to them, giving them a tired smile. “My dad dropped my car off, so you don’t have to worry about carting my ass around.” Her eyes turned to Chris, dark and sharp, flashing in the bluish glow of the fluorescents over their heads. “Get some sleep. Some actual sleep.”

Chris snorted, rolling his eyes. “Okay, mother,” he replied in an exaggerated put-upon tone.

Emily jabbed his chest with one harsh finger, eyes narrowing dangerously. “I mean it,” she bit out.

“God, okay,” he mumbled, lifting his hands in surrender, shuffling back just a step. She was absolutely terrifying. If Chris was a weaker man, he might have actually soiled himself.

Thankfully, Sam stepped in to his defense. “Don’t worry about him. I’ll take care of it.”

Emily glanced between them for a long moment, before finally backing off, nodding once. “Call me later,” she said, turning and heading off for the exit.

Chris watched her go, then looked down at Sam, shrugging his shoulders. “And then there were two.”

Sam grabbed him by the elbow, leading him off toward the exit as well. “C’mon, big boy. You’ve got a hot date with your bed. It hasn’t seen you in almost an entire day.”

It was dark when they emerged into the cold of the night, and Chris shivered, looking up at the moonlight outlining the clouds. He sighed, wrapping his arms around himself, trailing after Sam, every step he took away from the hospital a heavy stone dropping into his stomach. They’d just gotten Josh back, and now Chris was leaving him. Leaving him again. He frowned, dropping his eyes to the blonde walking beside him. She didn’t look too happy about it, either.

The ride back to Chris’s apartment was near-silent, with Sam focused on keeping her eyes open and Chris focusing on getting warm, curled up in the passenger seat, soaking up the warmth from three of the four vents.

Sam refused to just leave him to go inside by himself, insisting that she knew he wouldn’t actually sleep, and would just spend the night doing research or something like that. Chris couldn’t fight it, and he certainly couldn’t tell her that she was wrong, so he conceded, unlocking the door for her and gesturing for her to enter with a ridiculous flourish.

He changed for bed while she used his bathroom, and when she came back, he was sprawled out in bed, eyes already closed, phone in his hand.

Sam sighed, fond smile crossing her lips as she crossed the room to his bed, leaning down to carefully plug his phone into the charger, wrestling the blanket from under him to cover him up. Chris let out a little grunt, pressing his face directly into the pillow, huffing out a breath.

“Night, Chris,” she said softly, leaving the lamp on as she left his room, making sure to lock the door behind her as she left the apartment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> why does shit always end with chris losing consciousness? who knows man.
> 
> thank u for reading!! please feel free to leave me comments and all that! :D
> 
>  
> 
> the next chapter....is the Reunion...


	3. Chapter 3

When Chris finally woke up, early afternoon sunlight was streaming in through his window. He blinked himself to consciousness slowly, rubbing at the bridge of his nose where his glasses had left a painful indent. He must’ve forgotten to take them off last night, falling asleep basically as soon as his body hit the mattress. Was Sam still here?

He climbed out of bed, rubbing at his face, unplugging his phone (had he really had the foresight to plug it in?), shuffling towards the bathroom. He did his business, washed his hands, and then took a long moment to look at himself in the mirror, trying to go over the events of the past thirty-odd hours, trying to make some kind of sense out of them.

They’d found Josh. Josh had obviously been hungry, up there on the mountain. He probably ate the first thing that he got his hands on. The curse had been reactivated, and Josh had transformed into that… _thing_ that he’d seen in the hospital. An exorcism? He guessed? He really hoped that he would get more details about that. That seemed like something that really shouldn’t just be glossed over.

Chris couldn’t help but let his eyes drift down to the bandage on his neck, the edges peeling up just a bit from sleep. It wasn’t his first time at the rodeo, so he knew that he had to keep the area dry, which meant both a shower and an anxiety attack about how exactly Josh was holding up would have to wait.

He sighed, exiting the bathroom, returning to his room. He flicked the lamp beside his bed off, then dug around in his dresser for clean clothes -- or, at least, clean shirts. The slept-in feeling didn’t really feel great, and he was definitely gross and sweaty.

Once he was dressed, he made his way to the kitchen. Seeing no sign of Sam, he decided that she had definitely bailed on him as soon as he’d fallen asleep. He didn’t mind, obviously. It’d been really late and they’d both been through a lot of stress. He’d just kind of wished she would have crashed at his place. Mostly because it would have made the actual commute back to the hospital shorter, whenever that call came, but also because being alone at the moment was probably exactly the opposite of what either of them needed.

He fished around in his kitchen cabinets, searching around for something to eat. His hand brushed against a flimsy cardboard box on the top shelf, and he pulled it down. His heart lurched in his chest as he stared down at it.

Blueberry poptarts.  
Tears welled up in his eyes, and he sniffled.

_”No, Chris, dude, you don’t understand.” The laugh colored his voice like so much soft light as he rounded the shopping cart to stand beside Chris at the toaster pastry display. “Store-brand poptarts aren’t anywhere near as good as the real ones.” He took the box from Chris’s hands with a bright-eyed smile, placing it back on the shelf, snatching up the name-brand box and dropping that in the cart. “You’ll thank me later, promise.”_

A tear dropped from his chin onto the box, and he took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment. Josh was _alive_. He was alive, and stable, and definitely not-dead, so there was no point in crying over a box of goddamn toaster pastries. He pulled a foil packet from it before stowing it away, shutting the cabinet with more force than absolutely necessary, retreating to the living room, away from that emotional mess.

He plopped down on his couch, opening the packet eating slowly, eyes staring blankly at the dark television screen.

The vibration of his phone scared him out of his skin, and he was quick to yank it out of his pocket. A number he didn’t have saved in his phone. He quickly swiped to answer, pressing it so hard to his ear that it hurt.

“Hello?”

“Hello! I’m looking for Christopher Hartley?”

“Yeah, that’s me,” he said, heart pounding against his temples, eyes falling shut. The voice sounded bright and cheery, but he knew from experience that nice-sounding voices really didn’t ever equal good news.

“You’re Joshua Washington’s friend?” They waited for Chris to murmur a vague affirmative before continuing. “Dr. Ritter told me I could go ahead and give you a call to tell you that Joshua is out of the recovery room, and is ready for visitors as soon as you would like to see him.”

Chris was on his feet in seconds, eyes wide. Josh was okay. Chris could see him. Talk to him. He quickly ended the phone conversation, muttering his thanks and hanging up, pulling up his contact list. He called Mike first, but the call went straight to voicemail. He must’ve turned his phone off to sleep, or something. Chris left a brief voicemail, then hung up and called Sam.

“Hey,” she greeted after one and a half rings.

“The doctor called,” he said, surprised to hear himself sounding so enthusiastic about something. He hadn’t felt like this in weeks. “We can see him.”

Sam let out something that sounded like a relieved sigh on the other end of the line, and when she spoke, her voice sounded just a little bit thicker. “I’ll head over to pick you up now,” she said.

“Sam, no, just go. I’ll drive myself.” It didn’t make sense for Sam to come the whole way to his apartment. It was out of the way. She lived closer to the hospital, she would have to come to his place and then double back. Last night, it had been different.

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.”

They said their goodbyes, and Chris gathered up his things -- an external battery pack for his phone, his keys, a thicker jacket. He trusted that the phone chain would do its thing, and that other people would find out like they were supposed to. He didn’t have time to stop and send out texts to everyone, and it felt awkward to use the group chat when Josh himself was a part of it and would probably end up seeing it later.

The drive to the hospital was faster than he remembered it being last night, and when he pulled into the parking lot, he parked his beat up old Civic between Sam’s car and what looked suspiciously like Mike’s car. What the hell was he doing here? How did he get here before Chris?

He wrestled his coat on, stuffing his things into the pockets and climbing out of the car, fast-walking himself to the doors and pushing through. His eyes flicked toward the reception desk, and the person sitting behind it pointed a finger towards the waiting area he and the gang had sat in the day before.

When he rounded the corner, he saw Sam, and she looked up at him, giving him a bright smile. He moved and sat next to her, relaxing back into the hard plastic back of the chair. He felt simultaneous ease and nerves, and looking at her, he could tell that she was feeling the same way.

“Any news?” he asked her, shoving his hands into his pockets.

“Nothing yet. They said there’s someone in there already.” She shrugged. “Also said that only one person can go in at a time, so I was thinking you could go before me.”

He shook his head. “No, Sam, you go first. You got here first, it’s only fair.” Ulterior motive, who? Was he pushing her going first with the hopes that maybe, possibly he would get a little extra time? No way. Ridiculous.

A door down the hall swung open, and Sam and Chris looked up to see none other than _Michael Fucking Munroe_ walking towards them. He looked like hell, like he hadn’t slept, and his stride faltered when he realized he was being watched. Chris’s face pulled immediately into a frown, and Sam’s was one of utter shock.

“What are you doing here?” the two blonds barked out in unison, though Sam’s tone was definitely something gentler.

“I, uh.” Mike looked like he was struggling to find words to explain himself out of this situation, some kind of clever quip to shrug it all off. “I never went home,” he finally admitted, shifting his weight nervously. “I dropped Ashley off and came back.”

The guilt was easy to read on his face, but it really did nothing to alleviate the strange, heavy feeling of _anger and jealousy_ that curled in Chris’s gut. “So, you saw him already?” Chris asked, voice low and surprisingly even as he stood.

“Yeah.”

Before Chris could reply, Sam was jumping in. “How is he? Is he okay?”

Right. Josh was the priority here. Not the fact that Mike got first visitation when it was so clear that he shouldn’t have.

“I mean…” Mike heaved a sigh, shrugging his shoulders. “He’s not...the same. He’s definitely not the same.”

“Can you just cut to the chase here, Mike?” Chris pressed, voice coming out more clipped than he’d originally intended. Okay, so maybe snapping wasn’t the best when they were all running on restless sleep and adrenaline, but it got Mike talking faster, and that was what was important, right?

“He can’t talk, dude. Like, it’s hard to explain, but he can’t talk.”

So, Josh was mute. That was okay, though, because he was definitely alive, and that outweighed any and all things that might be wrong. Hell, Josh could suddenly have the biggest nibbling problem in the history of humanity, and Chris would be cool with it, as long as he was breathing and smirking and rolling his eyes.

“Earth to Chris?” Sam said, knocking her knuckles gently against his forehead.

He blinked a few times. “Uh...huh?” he asked, looking down at her.

“I’m gonna go in to see him, alright? Try not to zone too hard, space cadet.”

Chris nodded, watching her go, turning his eyes to Mike. “What about the phone chain, man?” he asked, still just a bit bitter. “Thought we all agreed to call around if anything happened?”

Mike lifted a hand, rubbed the back of his neck, visibly wincing and averting his eyes. He looked guilty. “Yeah, dude, I know,” he said after a minute. “I guess I just got overwhelmed, didn’t take much time to think. Just wanted to make sure he was okay, you know? And that he didn’t have to be alone just waiting for someone to show up. That’d suck.”

Dammit. He had a point. Chris couldn’t even argue.

“I’m gonna head home and catch some Z’s, though, bro. Gimme a call for real if things change.”

Mike extended a hesitant fist, and after a sigh and an over-exaggerated eye roll, he held out his own fist, bumping their knuckles together, smile tugging at one corner of his lips. “Later, man.”

If he was honest, he was relieved that Mike was going. He didn’t want to have to sit around in awkward silence with him alone in the waiting room.

Before too much longer, Sam was coming out of the room, eyes shining, lips pressed together. She looked like she had been crying. Or that she was going to start crying. Chris stood, and she gravitated right to his chest, pressing her head in and taking a few deep breaths while he awkwardly rubbed her back.

“You okay?” he asked gently, looking down at her as she pulled away, brows drawn in concern.

She sighed, nodding slowly, lifting her hand to swipe at a stray tear that had escaped her careful emotional schooling. “Yeah. This is mostly relief, I promise. He looks so small in there, though, Chris. Small, and alone.”

“He’s not alone anymore,” Chris said firmly, putting her hands on her shoulders. “You and me are gonna take shifts. We’re gonna be here during every single visiting hour. He’s got us.”

His goodbye with Sam went by in a blur, and he vaguely remembered promising to call her when he got home, but his eyes were on that door now. It was his turn. He shuffled towards it, pausing to straighten himself out, trying to make sense of his mess of hair. Three deep breaths later, he lifted his hand, knocking a few times before slowly pushing the door open.

It was so different this time. Josh’s head slowly turned toward him. He was wearing an eyepatch, and the entire surface of his right cheek was covered in bandages. When he saw Chris, his eye widened just a bit, lips twitching up at the corner, brows rising on his forehead. The expression lasted for about half a second, before falling into something a little insecure, a little bit afraid.  
“Afternoon, Cap’n,” Chris said, lifting his hand in the shape of a hook, doing his best pirate impression, flicking a flourished salute at Josh.

The brunet let out a little huff of laughter, visibly relaxing. He gestured toward the chair beside the bed, and it wasn’t until he came closer that he noticed the bandages wrapped around each of Josh’s fingertips. He wanted to take those hands. Hold them.

“So, what’s up, man? Mike said you can’t talk. Were you just giving him the silent treatment, or something?” Josh didn’t answer, just blinked at him, so Chris continued his babbling. “I mean, I personally would. Bet it drove him up a wall.”

Josh looked at him while he spoke, green gaze sweeping slowly over his face. His tongue darted out to wet his lips, and he swallowed thickly. His parted his lips, inhaling quietly, before starting to speak.

“I can’t talk.”

The statement on its own would have been totally fine, absolutely peachy, maybe even a little funny, with the context. But Chris found himself launching himself back into his chair at the sound of his own voice coming from between Josh’s unmoving lips, raspy from disuse.

“Dude, what the...what the fuck?” Chris swallowed, eyes wide and wild, flicking over the form of his best friend. This had to be a nightmare. Was this a nightmare? “Where’d your voice go?”

Josh groped at his little table, picking up a pen and notepad. He held the pen between his fingers clumsily, carefully printing out a word, brows drawing in concentration. When he turned to show it to Chris, there was only a single word on it.

_Wendigo._

“The Wendigo can perfectly mimic its prey,” Chris murmured softly, eyes widening.

“The Wendigo can perfectly mimic its prey,” Josh repeated, an identical copy of his words.

Chris couldn’t help but to think that this was going to be a million different kinds of complicated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for sticking by me and giving me your continued support and sending me so many nice comments despite it being almost two months since I've updated this bad boy!
> 
> I've been struggling a lot and actually sitting down to write this has gotten sort of hard for me currently. However, I do have some major plot points plotted and some of them already written! Not making any promises or getting your hopes up, but there's that info for you!
> 
> As always, thank you so, so much for reading, I really appreciate it, and feel free to leave me a comment and let me know what you think! I love getting feedback from you all, and comments are huge encouragement for me to keep going and writing!
> 
> <3


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